The Anglican Diocesan Development and Relief Organisation (ADDRO), a faith-based organisation, has distributed about 2,000 seedlings to smallholder farmers in Ghana to grow as part of efforts to mitigate challenges of climate change and improve agriculture productivity.
The exercise formed part of the Northern Ghana Climate Resilience Programme (NGCRP) being funded by the Episcopal Relief and Development, a United States of America-based organization that aimed to ensure environmental sustainability, food security and climate resilient communities.
Mr Ebenezer Alumire Ndebilla, the NGCRP Programme Coordinator, ADDRO, explained that the NGCRP project aimed at ensuring food security and livelihood support, economic empowerment for smallholder farmers and environmental protection against the effects of climate change.
Climate change
The seedlings, of different kinds of tree species, including mango, cashew, moringa, albizia, kapok, Mahogany and umbrella, among others and distributed to smallholder farmers from Bolgatanga Municipality, Bawku West, Talensi and Bongo Districts to plant and nurture.
Apart from supporting farmers with farm inputs such as improved seeds, fertilizer and best agronomic practices, and empowering them to engage in compost production to reduce the usage of chemical fertilizers, ADDRO with support from its partners annually nurses and distributes seedlings, including economic trees to farmers to grow.
The practice of tree planting was not only part of regreening strategies to help restore degraded landscapes and forest reserves but to encourage farmers to cultivate the habit of tree growing to help protect the environment.
Mr Ndebilla indicated that in the era of climate change challenges, it was imperative for farmers, especially the vulnerable smallholders, to be resilient to enable them to withstand the challenges and increase agriculture production.
“The importance of trees is enormous because apart from providing shade, and oxygen, serve as windbreaks, medicine, and woodlots for roofing, the trees also provide food like the mango and moringa and protect the soil from erosion and the topsoil nutrients from being washed away,” he said.
, a faith-based organisation, has distributed about 2,000 seedlings to smallholder farmers in Ghana to grow as part of efforts to mitigate challenges of climate change and improve agriculture productivity.){kind=link}